Contemporary Paintings, Prints, Ceramics, Sculptures, Photographs

Keeping a Visual Arts Diary to record your thoughts

As a visual artist inspirations occur daily, to record these ideas and thoughts I use a visual arts diary.

There’s a real risk an idea may be lost forever if notes and a small sketch are not scribbled down, it is crucial to have these notes all in one place.

In the past I’ve made the mistake of not jotting down my ideas, only to rack my brain weeks or months later as to the entirety of my original thoughts. Sometimes I would scribble a picture on a loose piece of paper but that’s a dangerous practice as a scrap piece of paper is easily lost or can be accidentally thrown out.

If you do tend to scribble your ideas on scrap paper purely because there may not be anything else available, be sure to paste it straight into your visual dairy as soon as you’re able.

A visual diary is the perfect place to record your daily thoughts, it’s comforting to know there is a catalogue to refer to if needed. It may also prove the idea was an original one of yours, in case a copyright accusation comes your way.

It’s truly uncanny how an idea comes to mind and several weeks, months or years later you’ll see an almost identical idea of your creation already made, as an artist trying to be original this can be very frustrating.

I feel there has to be an acceptance and understanding that with literally thousands if not millions of artist around the globe, all creating and being inspired by similar subjects, it’s inevitable that artist will create comparable artwork without ever having coming across one anothers art.

So to me all I can do, is do what I do, knowing someone out there somewhere may be having a similar idea and it’s almost a race as to who gets their idea and art out there first.

I doubt I’ll ever create all my visions of art in my lifetime there are so many, with new ideas constantly arising. That’s what being creative is all about, your mind is forever designing, creating, experimenting, dreaming, being inspired by surroundings, life experiences and emotions. Through all of this, I create art.

Choosing what to make can be challenging, sometimes I just create directly onto my canvas or sculpturing my stone with no preparation, when the creative juices are flowing, that’s when I feel I do my best work. On the other hand I get inspired by an older ideas, this is where I refer to my visual diary and flick through and think yes! I’m really in the mood to make this piece.

So get inspired and take notes, sketch those ideas and keep a visual diary, you may be glad you did.